2

HOLDEN MASTERS FELT naked without his mustache. But that was the least of his problems.

It had been a week since Sid had dropped his bombshell about the Ocean City condo, a long, boring week during which Holden had been able to lose the sling, but none of the stiffness in his shoulder and back, although his bruises had faded from deep purple to a pretty disgusting-looking orange-and-yellow mix.

He’d hidden out in his Philadelphia condo, his phone disconnected, ignoring the ringing doorbell and successfully dodging Rich “The Nose” New-some this morning as he’d been snuck out the back door of his building in, of all things, a laundry cart. Just like in the movies—although in the movies, Holden was pretty sure, the star was smuggled out with the clean laundry.

He was even driving himself to Ocean City in a nondescript dark blue rental car—an automatic, as he couldn’t use his right-arm well enough for his favored five-on-the-floor stick shift.

After a week of hiding, he was more than ready for Sid’s plan, eager for company, a little sunshine, maybe even a pair of dark sunglasses and a trip up the coast to one of the casinos. After all, pulling on those one-armed bandits could only be considered good therapy.

He saw the sign for the 7S exit off the Atlantic City Expressway and skillfully steered onto the ramp using only his left hand on the steering wheel, easing his foot off the gas as he came up against two lanes of bumper-to-bumper shore traffic and bade a wistful farewell to the speed he loved so well.

As he sat in his car going nowhere, he mentally traveled back to what really bothered him—and to the near future, which would probably quickly drive him out of his mind.

If only he had never given Woody his private number, and Woody hadn’t passed it along to his younger sister, Tiffany. Then, all things considered, Holden wouldn’t have believed the next eight weeks to be too bad.

But Tiffany had called. And, after fifteen minutes of abject pleading mingled with a few threats (a few of them from her father, who had grabbed the phone out of her hand), Tiffany was now coming to Ocean City. Tiffany and Woodstock LeGrand, his stepsiblings. The two of them. Together. In Holden’s house. Under Holden’s feet. Holden’s responsibility.

It sounded like the cast and plot for a Grade-B horror movie.

He drummed his fingertips on the steering wheel as he thought about his odd, but strangely lovable family.

His mother, Miranda Masters LeGrand Higgins Tuques, was off touring some Greek islands with her fourth husband, Harry Tuques, self-proclaimed king of Pre-Cut Carpet, Inc., so at least he didn’t have to worry about her swooping down on him with maternal tongue-cluckings and her three damn poodles in tow.

Holden smiled, shaking his head as he thought about his mother. Dear, sweet, lovely, flighty Miranda, who had too much money, too little sense and a firm belief that, to go to bed with her, a man must first make a detour to the nearest wedding chapel.

Which is how Holden had ended up with Woodstock and Tiffany LeGrand, two of Peter LeGrand’s children, both from different marriages Peter had squeezed in before Miranda, who had been his third wife in a string of five? six? total trips to the altar.

Marriage. The bane of the world. The dumbest sort of bondage. Brief, disposable, but damned expensive if you did it in a community property state—which is why Miranda unfailingly did her divorcing in Nevada and her marrying in California.

She’d done all right with Holden’s late father, the tennis-shoe magnate, but she’d hit the jackpot with her slightly reversed May-December marriage to Peter LeGrand, who’d first shown up on the pop charts in his teens and was still one of the acknowledged megastars of rock and roll. In fact, he was going out on tour with his band again this summer, which was one reason Woodstock, better known as Woody and just graduated from college, was coming east to stay with his big brother.

Tiffany was coming along because she was eighteen now, which made her only sixteen months younger than Peter’s latest gum-popping bride—an awkward situation, to put it mildly.

When you got right down to it, both kids were too old to look good alongside their father, who was fifty-three now, but still trying to maintain his image as a sex magnet on tour. Way too old. But, unfortunately, not too old, or even close to too mature, to need a baby-sitter while Daddy Peter was away, smashing guitars on stage.

Holden forgot about his stepsiblings as traffic thinned out as he crossed the Ninth Street bridge into Ocean City and began looking for the turnoff to the condo Sid had rented for the summer.

Well, at least he didn’t have to deal with Amanda Price, his girlfriend of the past six or so months—ever since they’d shot a jeans commercial together in Barbados. Amanda was a beautiful woman, a top-ranked supermodel, who looked great on his arm when he was out and about. Yes, a lovely woman. Ambitious. Maybe even driven. But without a lot of humor. And she’d been making noises about marriage lately, which always sent Holden running for the nearest exit.

Miranda was marriage. Peter was marriage. Holden did not believe in marriage!

Holden slowed the car as he searched out the address of the condo, peering out the passenger window to make out house numbers displayed in everything from seashells pasted onto railings to hand-painted knotty pine signs that displayed house names like Wistful Hideaway or Pop-Pop and Nana’s Nest.

His attention was caught by the official Indy pace car parked in front of one of the larger condos—or at least it was, until a jogger passing along the sidewalk in front of the impressive car pushed all coherent thought from his mind and he nearly ran into the curb as he quickly switched his gaze to the rearview mirror.

The sight of the jogger moving away from him was on a par with the recent vision of her coming toward him. He had, he decided, rarely before seen spandex put to such good use as it was in the hot pink shorts and halter top of the ponytailed, honey blond female just now turning the next corner and disappearing from view.

Holden considered circling the block, eager for another, better, look at the young woman, then decided against it. He was here for a rest, and to work. Playtime would have to come later, after his arm was completely healed—and after Woody and Tiffany were back in California driving Peter nuts, not him.

“This Puritan work ethic of yours is becoming pretty damn boring, Masters,” he grumbled aloud as he pulled the car to the curb in front of a building that instantly, crazily, reminded him of his long-ago love of lime Popsicles.

Leaving his luggage locked in the trunk, he climbed out of the car, stretched his cramped muscles—wincing as he tried to raise his arms above his head—and made his way up the brick path that led to the door at the side of the condo.

And then, he thought, the gods smiled at him. Because, just as he was fitting his key into the lock, he caught a glimpse of hot pink spandex out of the corner of his eye, coming toward him from the back of the condo.

“Lost the mustache, huh?” the honey blonde said, not even breathing hard as she continued to jog in place. “Can’t say as I blame you. I’ve often wondered about that thing, you know. I mean, didn’t it ever get caught on your face mask?”

There was no possible response to such a question, so Holden ignored it, although he did look at the young woman, deciding to give her the full benefit of the Masters smile. “Take a wrong turn, Pink Lady?”

She continued to jog in place, her own smile still pasted on her incredibly lovely, disturbingly intelligent face. “Nope. I’m your slave driver, Mr. Masters, here for the duration. Name’s Angel. Taylor Angel. I got here yesterday. So, how do you feel about pain?”

Sid had sicced a female therapist on him? Was this his idea of a joke? If so, Holden wasn’t laughing. He reached up to stroke his mustache with thumb and forefinger, then remembered that it was gone. “Depends on who is inflicting the pain, I suppose,” he said without inflection, turning the key and pushing open the door. “Right now, I’d say I’m in favor of it—if my agent was within strangling distance. You coming in, or were you thinking of running a marathon before lunch?’

She shook her head. “Nope, no marathon. I already put in my two miles for the day. Just cooling down, you know,” she said, then jogged past him into the condo, which gave him a mind-boggling vision of long. legs, short shorts and games two interested people could play.

“Your room is on the top level,” she told him before he could ask. “Mrs. Helper—Thelma—is upstairs, probably baking something sinfully fattening. There’s a dumbwaiter in the garage if you can’t carry your luggage yourself, although you should, as it would be good therapy. Not bad for a quarterback to keep his legs in shape, either. These stairs will come in handy on rainy days, so you don’t have to miss a workout. You need more than bedroom eyes and a killer smile to play in the NFL, you know.”

Holden decided he hated Taylor Angel. Hated her a lot. Beautiful women were supposed to look great draped on his arm, but keep their mouths shut. This one might have the looks of a Christie Brinkley, but she had the mouth of a Joan Rivers, and he had to beat down an impulse to gag her with her own ponytail.

“I’ll remember that, Miss Angel,” he said, not bothering to hide his sarcasm, “if I decide to try batting my eyelashes at the defense before airing one out to Bill Evers in the end zone.”

The sarcasm floated right over her head, or she chose to ignore it. He was pretty sure it was the latter, for this woman wasn’t the least bit dumb. “Evers? Good man, though sometimes he looks like he’s afraid of the ball. When he dropped that pass against Dallas in the play-offs last season, I nearly kicked in the television screen.”

Oh, good. She thought she knew football. Just what Holden didn’t need. “I never talk shop, Miss Angel,” he told her as he went over to the staircase and looked up, all the way up, to the top floor. Why didn’t Sid book him into a sixth-floor tenement? It probably would have had fewer stairs. “I think I can smell brownies.”

“Thelma,” Taylor reminded him, looking smug, most probably for his benefit. “Queen of the mix. If she can just add eggs and water, she’s a gourmet baker. But she’s a whiz with roast beef—just ask her. Come on,” she added, turning for the door once more, “let’s get your luggage. I want to see you on my table, so I can get an idea of how much work we have ahead of us.”

See you on my table. The words stopped Holden in his tracks. “You’re really a physical therapist? Why am I having trouble with this?”

“Physical therapist and licensed massage therapist, actually. You’ll need more massage probably, according to what Sid told me about your injury,” she responded as she walked outside, so that Holden had no choice except to follow her. “So Uncle Sid really didn’t tell you about me? I wonder why.”

“Uncle Sid?” Oh, yeah. I’m going to kill that man. “Sid’s your uncle?”

She stood next to the trunk of the car, waiting for him to open it. “Courtesy uncle, actually. His parents and mine played bridge together eons ago, before his parents moved to Florida and mine to the boonies, as they call it. I was surprised when I got his call last week, but he said he wanted somebody he could trust not to go running to the tabloids with the story of your injury, either now or after my job is done. It made sense. Lots of people make money on you, don’t they, Mr. Masters?”

“Dozens of them. And Sid makes most of it,” Holden grumbled, opening the trunk and reaching in to pull out one of his suitcases, only to have Taylor reach out and grab his arm.

“Not that way, Mr. Masters,” she admonished him, putting one hand on his forearm, the other on his back. Her pink spandex-encased body touched his from shoulder to hip, which did strange things to his concentration. “You’re not using the correct muscles.”

He ignored the ripple of awareness that cut through his body, concentrating on Taylor’s words, rather than her hands, her slim body. Which wasn’t easy. “What?”

“I’d give you the technical names for everything if I wanted to bore you out of your skull,” she answered, “but it would be easier to say that you have injured your shoulder and, because it hurts when you do certain things—make certain moves—you have begun to overcompensate, using muscles that aren’t injured to do what the injured ones used to do.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

“No, I’m not. And too much of that for too long a time, my friend, and you’ll end up with lost muscle memory and a frozen shoulder, which also isn’t a laughing matter. Now—stop shoving your elbow into your side to help yourself move and reach out with your whole arm to pick up the suitcase.”

He did as she said. He didn’t want to, hadn’t even noticed that he had been moving incorrectly, but he wanted her to move away from him; move her honey blond hair and perfumed scent and strong hands far, far away from him.

Or closer.

“Damn!” he exclaimed as he fully extended his arm, then tried to lift the suitcase—sending a stabbing pain and a disturbing weakness through his right arm and shoulder. “That hurts.”

“We’ll fix it,” Taylor said matter-of-factly, stepping in front of him and lifting out both suitcases at once, which made Holden long to fire her on the spot.

“We, Miss Angel?”

“Neither one of us can do it alone, Mr. Masters. I’ll set up my table after lunch, and we can do a thorough evaluation then—take a few measurements, check your range of motion, that sort of stuff. Until then, you and Thelma can get acquainted,” she flung back at him, then left him standing in the street.

“Will I see you at lunch?” he called after her, wishing he could have thought before he spoke. After all, it wasn’t as if he’d miss her if she went away.

She turned and looked back at him. “I do plan to eat, yes. And this isn’t some social experiment, Mr. Masters. This is my job and I plan to do it very, very well. You’ll see me morning, noon and night for the next eight weeks. Get used to it!”

“I’ll work on it,” he snapped, then added, slamming down the trunk lid with his left hand, “and I’m still going to kill Sid.”

TAYLOR HAD ALREADY thrown the suitcases on Holden’s bed and was halfway down the seeming half-dozen small flights of stairs before he passed her going the other way. She smiled her most blighting smile and kept on going, not stopping until she was safely behind the closed door of her own bedroom.

“Uncle Sid—you’re in big, big trouble!” she vowed, looking up at the ceiling, ordering her heart rate to slow to a reasonable speed. It had gone into overdrive the moment she’d laid eyes on Holden Masters and had actually skipped a beat when he’d smiled at her with those gorgeous green eyes. She wouldn’t even think about what had happened to her when she’d touched him to correct his incorrect movement, when her fingers had pressed against the taut muscle beneath his black cotton-knit shirt.

“It’s a job, Angel,” she told herself as she left the room and entered the adjoining bathroom to splash cold water on her face. “Just another job.”

She looked at herself in the mirror, pulled the band from her ponytail so that her hair fell to below her shoulders, and winced. “And in another hour, that job is going to be lying facedown and defenseless on your massage table while you put some Yanni on the CD player, oil up your hands and…oh, brother!”

She stripped off her jogging clothes and stepped into the shower, sticking her head beneath the needle-sharp spray, hoping to calm herself. It wasn’t, after all, as if she hadn’t given massages to a handsome, intelligent, famous, living Adonis of a man before this. There had been Geoff, right? Geoff, the golf pro. Geoff, who had become her first and only lover.

Bad comparison…

She rubbed shampoo into her hair. Maybe it wouldn’t take eight weeks to get Holden Masters back into shape. He hadn’t been injured all that long, hadn’t had a lot of time to stiffen up or lose muscle memory. She could probably whip him into fighting strength in a couple of weeks. Three, tops. Three times a day for therapy, once a day for massage, some running on the beach to keep his general muscle tone and strengthen his legs—that shouldn’t be bad. She could certainly handle that without going all sloppy or weak in the knees.

Yeah, right…

Three weeks of Holden Masters living in the same condo, with Thelma there for protection during the day and three floors of condo separating them the rest of the time, through all the long, long nights.

Three weeks of looking into those absurdly beautiful green eyes.

Three weeks of touching his body, of looking at him, stripped to the waist, lying on her massage table.

Three weeks of living closely, intimately, with the idol of millions, the face that had launched a thousand commercials, boosted the sales of a thousand products, the athlete who had just been named Star of the Millennium by some sports magazine.

Oh, yeah. She could do this.

Standing on her head.

Right.

“I’m in big trouble,” Taylor groaned, turning the water to cold and sticking her head under the spray once more. “Big, big trouble!”